• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_research, May 3, 2016

SalesFuel polled 200 media sales managers, 136 executive managers and 742 sales representatives across all types of traditional and digital media, and found that the average of overall sales revenue expected to come from digital advertising/marketing services in 2016 turned out to be 22.96%. Newspapers forecasted the most, with an average of 33.3% of revenue expected from digital.

In the 7th annual State of Media Sales survey, respondents made it clear that they think and feel positive about revenue for 2016. 41.5% forecast revenue to increase 1%-5% for the calendar year 2016, versus the calendar year 2015. The study specifically excluded any political ad sales revenue from this question and its responses.

Media salespeople and their managers believe the health care and automotive industry sectors will provide the biggest increase to revenues, with 53% forecasting health-care increases and 49% predicting increases in automotive media buys.

In addition, asking about political ad spending for 2016, 69% of those in the media sales industry envision the political industry sector bringing in more advertising revenue at their organizations.

The results also made it evident that media salespeople and managers are trying to stay current in the ever-changing world of digital advertising and digital marketing services. The digital transformation is a pretty hot topic in sellers’ minds, goals and actions, too. 80% of respondents said the same sales team sells both digital and legacy/non-digital.

SalesFuel CEO C. Lee Smith says  “… use the rapid turnover of your sales team to your advantage… Legacy reps who stay on board must receive extensive retraining on digital… given specific sales quotas on digital products… traditional media pays the bills today… digital revenue is your company’s future… “

More information from MediaSalesToday can be found here.